


No Exit

by ThetaSigma



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-02-12 02:32:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12949401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThetaSigma/pseuds/ThetaSigma
Summary: The Doctor doesn't know where he is. He's in a mansion, with corridors and doors stretching in all directions, light spilling in from high windows. No sign of the TARDIS.Sherlock is the only one who can save him. Sherlock is the only one who knowsexactlywhere he is.In a way, this is all Sherlock's fault. In another way, this is all the Doctor's fault.





	No Exit

The Doctor doesn’t know where he is. 

He looks around. He doesn’t see the TARDIS. How did he get here, if not the TARDIS?

He forces himself to take stock of his surroundings. He’s in a mansion. Endless corridors and doorways and windows surround him. Doors, open and shut, beckon. Light spills in from high windows, and he tries to figure out the time of the day and year from the sun. Mid-afternoon, he guesses? Is he even on Earth?

He can’t tell. How can he not _tell_?

He tastes the air.

It doesn’t taste like Earth. Not quite.

He moves to the first door on his left. The door is shut and he turns the handle. Locked. He pulls out his sonic, and the door doesn’t budge even when he sonics it.

He remembers himself saying, “ _Anything you don’t want me to see, imagine a door and close it._ ”

Is he in someone’s mind?

Who has a mind like this?

*** 

“I don’t have the _words_ ,” the Doctor growls, frustrated. “I’ll have to show you. Telepathy.”

“Allow you into my _mind_?!” Sherlock snaps. “No. A thousand times no.”

“Anything you don’t want me to see, just imagine a door and close it,” the Doctor reassures him.

Sherlock looks torn, but his desire for knowledge is quickly winning. “Give me a minute,” he says finally. He settles onto the couch and folds his hands under his chin. The Doctor looks puzzled and shoots John a look. John gives Sherlock a fond look. 

“It’s fine, let him reorganize up there first, then he’ll let you in,” John says.

It takes closer to twenty minutes, but Sherlock reemerges and says, “Fine, I’ve placed what I don’t want you to see off-limits. How do you do this?”

“Hands on my temples,” the Doctor instructs. He places his hands on Sherlock’s.

The Doctor’s done this many times before. Not excessively, but he knows what to expect, sliding into a human’s mind.

Sherlock’s is like _nothing_ he’s ever seen before, and he’s been in genius’ brains before.

An endless house – a _mansion_ , really – expands before him in all directions. Corridors and rooms and staircases and doors, open and shut, and windows with light streaming in surround him. The amount of detail is staggering. 

He buckles under it for a moment, unable to find his bearings. He turns, and turns, not sure where to go, where to start, how to inject _his_ knowledge, _himself_ , into this. 

_Where_ is he?

He doesn’t know where he is.

He loses track of himself.

*** 

Closed doors are off-limits, then. 

He moves to an open one and glances at the door. _The Human Body_ , it says.

The room is large and disorganized. Books and papers litter the room on tables. There’s a chair there, a comfy-looking leather armchair. The Doctor looks at the walls, covered in photographs of bodies. Alive, dead, dissected, whole.

The books are filled with information. Anatomy. Physiology. Disease. Inner workings. Poisons, with cross-reference to _Poison Room, Second Floor_. Reproduction  & Sexual Arousal, with cross-reference to _Sexual Behavior; see Psychology, Third Floor; Deductions Regarding Others’ Sexual Habits – see specific rooms or Delete; Sex with John Watson, John’s Wing, Room 34; Sexual History Pre-John Watson, Ground Floor_. Injuries, with more cross-references. The Doctor skips these, figuring that he’s lost enough as is. They don’t look like clues for him, more like clues for someone else. He doesn’t need to get side-tracked, not now.

He leaves, and wanders past closed doors ( _State Secrets, Ongoing Cases, Passwords_ ) until he finds another room.

 _British History_ , the door reads. The Doctor enters. The room is filled with more books, but the history jumps from point to point sporadically, entire sections utterly _missing_ , and other parts delved into in great detail. Murders and other crimes are gone into in extreme detail. More cross-references after each one: _See History of Crime, in Criminal Wing_.

The Doctor casts about for empty paper. He needs to start making a map. He finds one and a pen, _finally_ , and hesitantly starts writing. If he is in someone’s mind ( _is he?_ ), is he making a memory? Is he… how does this work?

He sketches the room he had left not long ago, marks it, the corridor he had found himself in, the doors he had found shut, and marks the room he’s in now.

The doors he’s passed don’t seem organized logically. The Human Body room was next to ongoing cases, next to passwords, next to state secrets….

He wanders again. He doesn’t need to review British history.

More closed doors. Many of them unlabeled, this time. He marks them on his map, more as a way to determine how far he’s come.

*** 

Sherlock speaks after several minutes, not dislodging either of their hands. “He’s lost in there,” he mumbles to John. “John, I don’t know what to do. He’s trapped in my mind palace.”

“Get him out,” John orders.

“John, _there are no exits_.”

“How do _you_ get out?” John asks. 

Sherlock manages a shrug. “I just … leave. I can’t create an exit from the outside, John.”

“You need to.”

“John, I can’t focus and maintain the connection.”

“What connection?”

Sherlock gives a grunt of frustration. “I can see into his mind. It’s _chaos_ in there, John! But I can tell this connection between us needs to be maintained. I don’t know what’ll happen if I just break it. He might end up trapped in me forever.”

“Can’t he maintain the connection?”

“He’s lost.”

“Fuck.”

John thinks. He doesn’t know anything about mind palaces (hell, he doesn’t even have a mind cupboard), but Sherlock is staring fixedly at the Doctor’s blank face, trying to keep the telepathic connection in place. 

*** 

The Doctor wanders, glancing into open rooms. _European History_. He passes. Not helpful. It feels a little like wandering the TARDIS. Endless. Full of rooms. But it’s not, it doesn’t feel right, and he _knows_ his way around the TARDIS. Here, he’s utterly lost. He doesn’t even feel like _himself_.

He comes to another room. _The Doctor’s Knowledge_ , it says. Oh. Actually helpful!

He enters. It’s completely empty. Was _this_ the room he was meant to fill?

He doesn’t remember why he’s here. What he was supposed to _accomplish_ by entering someone else’s mind. 

He leaves again. No point in being in an empty room.

He comes to a room. The door isn’t properly open, not like the other ones, but it’s not shut either. The Doctor hesitates. 

_Pointless Advice_ , the door says. The sign below it says, _Don’t enter this room, really, you’ll probably regret it_.

He could do with some advice. The Doctor pushes on the door, seeing if it’ll open, and it does. He enters.

A tall man is lounging in a chair. Thin. Three piece suit. A name pings at him. Is this… Sherlock? The name Sherlock seems important to the Doctor.

“Are you Sherlock?”

“No. Do have a seat, won’t you?”

The Doctor shakes his head, trying to clear it. “Where am I?” he demands. 

“The Mind Palace,” the man says, with a sneer. “Ridiculous thing.”

“The… Mind Palace? What is that?”

The man gives him an unimpressed look. “You’re in his mind. Right where you wanted to be. Although I think you intended this to go differently, didn’t you, Doctor?”

The Doctor frowns, thinks, tries to, anyway, it’s so hard, everything in here is pressing in on him. What is he, who is he, _where is he?_

“You’re a memory?”

“A figment of his imagination.”

He feels so _slow_ , like only part of _his_ mind made the trip with him. Probable, actually. “Why?”

“The sign on the door,” the man says. “I dispense advice he doesn’t actually follow when he needs it. Don’t get much use these days, unless he feels like giving himself a stern talking-to, and really, when did Sherlock give himself a stern talking-to? No, my actual counterpart does that in person often enough.”

***

“Oh, he found the Mycroft room,” Sherlock grumbles. “I thought I shut that door.”

“The Mycroft room?” John asks. “Mycroft has his own room? I thought you deleted him.”

“Mycroft has several rooms, he’s in many of my memories. No, the Mycroft room is the Pointless Advice room, where I keep a Mycroft figure for when I need a lecture to see something a different way.”

“Do _I_ have a room?” John asks curiously.

“Please, John, you have a whole wing,” Sherlock says fondly. “Any more data about you, and I’ll have to build a separate palace just to hold it all.” He falls silent, but it’s not an uncomfortable one. “Oh! I don’t know why I didn’t see it sooner! John, _you’re the answer!_ ”

“Sherlock?”

“I can’t go in there, but I can send him _you_.”

“I can’t join this mind-meld, Sherlock.”

“I’ll explain after,” Sherlock says. He closes his eyes and concentrates hard.

*** 

The man looks around. “Oh, help of some sorts is on the way, Doctor.” 

“How do you know who I am?” the Doctor asks warily.

“Sherlock didn’t forget you, you forgot him,” the man explains. “You’re disoriented by the trip. Not quite what you were expecting, was it? The Mind Palace?”

“What _is_ this place?” the Doctor asks. “What is a Mind Palace?”

“This is where my brother stores his memories and all his information,” the man says simply. “Filed and organized, in metaphysical locations.”

The Doctor looks around. It’s _so much more_ than anything he’s ever seen in a human mind. “Your brother?”

“Yes, who better to dispense pointless advice than an older sibling?”

“You know a lot about this, then,” the Doctor concludes. “You must know how I can leave again.”

The man shakes his head. “He doesn’t let me out of this room.”

“It’s a task I’m meant to do on my own then,” the Doctor guesses. “Get out of here. I’ve been making a map. And you’re connected with him – ”

“You’re slow, Doctor, I _am_ him – I’m a figment of his imagination.”

“Okay, so he knows where I am? He can’t help though, he’s stuck too?”

“He is helping,” the man says. “He’ll find you.”

The Doctor knows the best way to be found is to stay put and let them come to you. However, the last thing the Doctor is good at is _staying put_ , so he gets up and leaves the room. As far as advice went, this was actually fairly pointless, he thinks.

He looks up and down the corridors. Where to next?

“There you are,” a voice says. 

There’s a man in front of him. Shorter than him. 5’7”? About that. Blonde, going a bit gray. His face looks kind, but stern. He’s dressed in a jumper and jeans, looks utterly unassuming, and is standing in the corridor like he’s been waiting for the Doctor.

And he wasn’t there a minute ago.

The Doctor stares.

“Who are you?”

“Captain Watson,” the man says. “I’m here to get you out.”

*** 

“Got him,” Sherlock grunts. “You’re with him.”

“No, I’m right here,” John protests, confused.

“Not out here, in _there_.”

“I… you know what, Sherlock, love, just explain after, yeah?”

*** 

“Captain Watson?” the Doctor asks. He looks around. He still feels utterly wrong-footed, and most of his mind isn’t functioning. “I suppose I’ll just follow you, then?”

“Probably for the best,” Watson says with a grin. “I know my way around, and you have an incomplete map of one floor.”

“How many floors does this place have?”

Watson considers the question. “Not quite sure, really. I know my way around, but he keeps changing the architecture. At least ten or eleven. As he needs. And then there are the bits that dip here or stick up there,” he adds, sounding fond. “Well, come on then.”

“What _happened_?” the Doctor asks. “Do you know? I don’t feel right.”

“Not quite sure,” Watson admits. “Sherlock’s busy trying to keep the connection alive right now, so he’s not exactly rooting through _your_ mind for the answer – which you should be grateful for, by the way, because it’s not exactly like he has any respect for personal boundaries. But as far as I – he? – can tell, you miscalculated. Probably didn’t expect this.”

“No, definitely not,” the Doctor murmurs. They’re walking down the corridor. It _is_ endless, the Doctor’s starting to think. 

“How _big_ is this place?” he asks.

Watson laughs. “It’s a _mind_ , Doctor. Space has no meaning in here.”

“Is there an exit?”

Watson looks away. “No,” he says finally. “Not yet. Sherlock never needed one, because he can come and go as he wants. And it’s not like I need to leave here.”

“You’re another figment of his imagination,” the Doctor realizes. The thought makes him sad, for some reason. Someone like this shouldn’t just be dreamed up, he thinks.

“’Course I am,” Captain Watson responds. “But I’m always there for him, in here or out there.”

“Out there?”

Watson smiles. “I’m not an imaginary friend, Doctor. Everyone you meet in here is someone Sherlock knows. I’m his husband.”

“And he calls you _Captain Watson_ in his mind?”

“Nah, he makes _you_ call me Captain Watson in his mind. Big difference. Don’t worry, though, I actually _was_ a Captain at one point. Unlike that Captain Harkness you met once. … Okay, so apparently he’s gotten bored and started skimming your memories. You know, keeping that man out of trouble is a full-time occupation.”

“Sherlock or Jack?”

“Both, I expect,” Watson says with a laugh. 

The Doctor narrows his eyes. Watson has distracted him admirably from a _very important point_. “There’s no exit.”

Watson sobers. “Ah, right, that. No. And Sherlock needs to actually _enter_ his mind palace to rearrange anything in here, and he can’t do that without breaking the connection, and from what he can tell from your mind, that would likely trap you in here permanently.”

“So why are we walking?”

“Would you prefer to just stand around?”

“Not particularly.”

*** 

“John,” Sherlock groans. “I can’t think of a way to _get him out_.”

This time it’s John who has the flash of insight. “I know you said you can’t change the mind palace without being in there. But can you, I dunno, visualize a pathway between your brains?”

“Yes! I can! John, you’re _brilliant_!”

“You married me for a reason, Sherlock,” John says mildly.

“I married you for many reasons,” Sherlock says reprovingly.

“I know, love. I know.”

*** 

“It seems I thought of the answer. The other me,” Captain Watson says. A path shimmers into existence before them, superimposed on the corridor.

A voice rings out in the Mind Palace, echoing everywhere. _WALK ON THE PATH. JOHN, DO NOT GO PAST THE CLEARLY MARKED DOOR. YOU CANNOT GO PAST THE DOOR. DOCTOR, YOU **MUST** GO PAST THE DOOR. SAFE TRAVELS._

“Well, that’s clear enough,” Watson says, and steps onto the path. “Coming?”

“What’s this path?” the Doctor asks warily. It is utterly out of place with everything, a hasty addition, and still blinking in and out of existence.

“The path back to _you_ ,” Watson says. “Quickly, now, I don’t know how long he can hold it.”

The Doctor steps on. It looks dangerous. He likes dangerous.

By the gleam in Watson’s eyes, it’s clear he likes dangerous, too.

The path is shimmering the whole time and seems out of phase with the rest of the Mind Palace, elevated above it. 

_HURRY UP I DON’T KNOW HOW LONG I CAN HOLD THIS._

They run. 

A door appears. A solid door, and the Doctor stops. Doors are bad, here, he remembers that. He’s not supposed to open them. He remembers that.

_OPEN THE DAMN DOOR AND GO THROUGH ALREADY._

The Doctor hesitates.

“Oh, for…” Watson mutters, and places his hand on the doorknob. He hisses, snatching his hand back. 

_NOT YOU, JOHN, YOU CAN’T TOUCH THE DOOR._

The Doctor places his hand on the door cautiously, but it’s pleasantly warm to the touch, and gives a puzzled look to Watson.

“Captain?” he asks.

“Burned _me_ ,” Watson explains with a shrug.

The Doctor nods – the path back to him. Back to _his_ mind – this is the door leading to his mind, of course a part of Sherlock’s mind can’t touch it. He throws open the door and steps through.

He knows where he is.

Waves of _him, me, I know this, I am me finally me me me_ crash through him.

*** 

His hands fall from Sherlock’s temples as he takes deep, shuddering breaths. 

Sherlock lets his hands fall. “We are _never_ doing that again,” he says, unfolding himself from the couch. 

“Sherlock!” John admonishes, getting up to make sure the gasping man on the couch is okay. “Doctor, are you alright?”

The Doctor waves him off. “Fine. Fine,” he says. He peers at John. “Captain Watson?”

John laughs. “It’s John. We’ve met, Doctor.”

The Doctor shakes his head. “It’s still… I’m still returning to myself, I think. An experience, that, one I don’t think I’ll repeat, as fascinating as it was, but still coming back to myself.”

“ _Captain_ Watson?” John says a moment later. “No one’s called me that for ten years.” He looks up at Sherlock. “Sherlock, that explanation about me being in your mind, now?”

“Oh, John, you’re always with me,” Sherlock says softly. “You have free reign of my mind palace, and I made you his guide.” And then he adds, with a smirk, “And I may have told him you were _Captain Watson_.”

John laughs, then pulls Sherlock close. “You’re always with me, too, Sherlock. Maybe not in the mind palace sense, but…”

“I know,” Sherlock says, and John knows Sherlock does know what he’s trying so badly to say.

The Doctor looks up. “That was…” Words fail him for a moment, which is astounding, because he’s the _Doctor_ , and words _never_ fail him. “… _unique_ ,” he finally says. “I’ve never seen anything like that. I’ve never lost myself like that in someone’s mind! How did you do that? Are you _human_?”

“I’ve been told no,” Sherlock says dryly.

“Don’t listen to them,” John says fiercely, wrapping a protective arm around Sherlock’s waist. “He’s the most _human_ human you’ll ever meet.”

“ _Brilliant_ ,” the Doctor grins. “You’ll have to teach me. This mind palace. You’ll have to show me how to make one. Ohhh, it was brilliant, utterly brilliant. I need to know.”

“Yes,” Sherlock says. “Your mind is _chaos_.”

“On the other hand,” John says, “If both of you had mind palaces, Sherlock, _you_ could have ended up lost in _his_ as well, and then we’d have been _really_ screwed.”


End file.
